For many years chafing dishes have been in wide-spread use as a utensil for heating or even cooking a variety of food products. Chafing dishes are often employed as a means of maintaining foods which are cooked in the kitchen at an elevated temperature in the dining room.
Typically chafing dish assemblies have included a dish or tray-like food container, which is metallic, ceramic or glass and a stand or leg structure, which supports the dish or tray above a support surface, such as a table or counter top. Most chafing dishes include a shelf or framework mounted between the legs of the stand parallel to the bottom of the chafing dish which will hold a chafing dish heater. The heater shelf usually supports a wick-based heater which burns a fluid fuel, such as alcohol, or canned chemical in a solid or gel form. The chafing dish heater device is positioned on the shelf at a level and location below the bottom of the chafing dish which will position the flame from the heater unit to warm food contained in the chafing dish.
Wick-based liquid fuel heaters and solid or gel chemical chafing dish heaters have been found to have certain disadvantages. Some of the chafing dish heaters, for example, employ flammable liquids, like alcohol, which can be spilled and present a substantial safety problem. Other heaters may include toxic chemicals or produce uneven flames and suffer from the evaporation of chemicals. Chafing dish heaters, in general, have been constructed n a manner making adjustment of the heat output virtually impossible. Moreover, the shelves used to support such heater units often limit or fix the ability t laterally position or adjust the location of the heater unit with respect to the chafing dish.
Notwithstanding the disadvantages which may exist with prior art chafing dishes, they usually are effective food warming devices and hundreds of thousands, and probably millions, of chafing dishes are currently in use. Since there are generally no standards in the industry, chafing dishes are manufactured in a variety of sizes with a variety of leg and heater shelf configurations. Any attempt to provide an improved system for heating chafing dishes, therefore, is faced with the substantial problem of providing apparatus which is sufficiently universal that it can be used with or retro-fit to a wide range of existing chafing dishes.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus which is suitable for use in place of a heater unit for a chafing dish assembly, which apparatus is adaptable for use with a wide range of existing chafing dishes.
Another object of the present invention to provide a burner assembly which can be used as a heater unit for heating a chafing dish, or the like, which burner assembly is self-supporting and will accommodate different chafing dish leg configurations or other support structures including heater support shelves.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a burner assembly for heating a chafing dish that is capable of vertical and lateral adjustments relative to the chafing dish and support legs so as to be suitable for use with a wide variety of chafing dishes.
Still a further object of the present invention is to provide a heating assembly for heating a chafing dish which employs butane fuel and an adjustable burner assembly suitable for substantial variation of the heat output to the chafing dish.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a burner assembly for heating a chafing dish which was enhanced safety as compared to standard chafing dish heating units.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a burner assembly for heating a chafing dish in which a user cannot support a cooking vessel directly on the burner head of the assembly, without tipping the assembly over, thereby making the assembly safer by restricting use of the burner assembly to use in combination with a chafing dish having its own leg structure.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a burner assembly for heating a chafing dish which is inexpensive to construct and which is highly portable.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a combination chafing dish and burner assembly therefor in which the location of the heat output from the burner assembly can be easily laterally adjusted relative to the chafing dish.
The burner assembly of the present invention has other objects and features of advantage which will become apparent from, or are set forth in more detail in, the accompanying drawings and the following description of the Best Mode of Carrying Out the Invention.